Killer Returns To The Scene Of The Crime

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OK - I know that there is more than enough hard evidence to convict this scumbag several times over...and that this ...

Killer Returns To The Scene Of The Crime

As they often do.

OK - I know that there is more than enough hard evidence to convict this scumbag several times over...and that this was FAR from the perfect crime....but, I just thought that this murder scenario was particularly interesting in that he went back to the body location to retreive his signature "green ink" pen.

If there was no other incriminating evidence against this guy...he would have written his own murder conviction in green ink alone.

The case against Raymond Clark is as solid as the jailhouse walls that hold him.

Investigators say this is the evidence that will keep him behind bars - quite possibly for the rest of his life:

DNA tests proving Annie Le's blood is on Clark's boots, which have his name on them.

tests identifying his DNA on her body and clothing.

More tests identifying her DNA and hair on him and his clothing.

Just one of those matches would be enough to make the case.

And then there is the green pen.

Clark did not want to be just some guy who cleans mouse cages, so he distinguished himself by always signing in for work with a pen that used green ink.

Every day, including the day of the killing.

Investigators believe he dropped the pen at the scene and was unable to retrieve it after it fell into a crevice.

He apparently hoped to fish it out when he showed up at the lab the day after the killing with a backpack containing wire, fishing hooks and bubble gum.

Even more damning than the pen is his swipe card, which indicates he spent nearly an hour in the room with Le's body after the murder. One can only imagine what was going through his mind.

The swipe card records then show him suddenly moving from room to room, as if he were searching for a place to hide a body.

The records have him returning to the room and finally heading toward the utilities conduit where the body was later found.

The medical evidence tells investigators Le was first hit and then strangled, as if a sudden loss of temper was followed by an explosion of rage.

The investigators have no doubt who did it - and how.

The only question is why.

Here they can only theorize.

They note the e-mail exchange in which Clark objected to Le being lax with protocols for tending lab mice. Le responded in a conciliatory tone, which fits what investigators have learned about her.

What would not fit would be for her to have been any less conciliatory in person when she encountered Clark at the lab the day of the killing.

Investigators speculate that he criticized her for some additional lapse in protocol. His concern was likely less the animals' welfare than his need to be in charge, if only when it came to mice.

Everything everybody knows about Le suggests she would not seek to put him in his place or somehow demean him.

More likely, she was simply distracted. Her wedding was just five days away. Her mind was no doubt filled with thoughts about her hair, her dress, the guest list. And she was trying to get all her pressing lab work done.

Investigators believe she may have responded to Clark with something like, "Yeah, I'll get to it, thanks. I'm busy now."

A guy such as Clark could have mistaken distracted for dismissive.

And what he took for dismissive may have been harder for him to take from a young, smart, diminutive woman.

A surveillance camera captured Clark leaving the building following a fire alarm that he may have set off to give himself an excuse for leaving in the middle of a workday.

The footage is said to show him holding his head in his hands, clearly distraught.

After Le went missing, Clark was interviewed. He denied seeing her the day of the killing, not figuring he was depriving himself of later cooking up a story about how his DNA got on her and her DNA got on him.

He was also given a polygraph test. The machine went off the chart when he was asked, "Do you know where she is now?"

That's when Clark asked for a lawyer.

The investigators could no longer question him and they may never learn exactly why Le was killed.

Unfortunately for Clark, this is real life, not a TV cop show. Investigators do not necessarily need to establish a motive.

The evidence leaves them with not a shadow of a doubt as to who did it.

If Clark thinks he can beat this case, he might as well beat his head against those jailhouse walls.